MH17 and Gaza: Two different elite reactions

Neil Clark is a journalist, writer, broadcaster and blogger. He has written for many newspapers and magazines in the UK and other countries including The Guardian, Morning Star, Daily and Sunday Express, Mail on Sunday, Daily Mail, Daily Telegraph, New Statesman, The Spectator, The Week, and The American Conservative. He is a regular pundit on RT and has also appeared on BBC TV and radio, Sky News, Press TV and the Voice of Russia. He is the co-founder of the Campaign For Public Ownership @PublicOwnership. His award winning blog can be found at www.neilclark66.blogspot.com. He tweets on politics and world affairs @NeilClark66

Even though no conclusive evidence has yet been produced that
rebels in the east of Ukraine did shoot down the Malaysian
airliner, Western elites, neocon and faux-left commentators have
gone on a foaming-at-the-mouth anti-Russian frenzy holding
President Putin personally responsible for the deaths and hurling
abuse at those of us who don’t join in the “It’s all Russia’s
fault” blame game.

Although we don't have conclusive proof that Russia did supply
the rebels with the equipment that would enable them to shoot
down an aircraft travelling at such a high altitude (Russia has
issued firm denials), we are told that “the world is watching
Putin” and that Russia must be punished with yet more sanctions.

Yet in Gaza, we know for sure who is doing the killing or at
least the vast majority of it. However, there is no elite
condemnation of Israel here – just silence, or else repeated
platitudes about how Israel is justified in launching a military
operation on grounds of “self defense” and how Hamas must stop
its rocket attacks. Whatever Israel does, even if it’s killing
children who were playing football on the beach, there are excuses made for its behavior.

Anyone watching the events of the past week from another planet
would find it all rather bewildering.

Russia is already judged ‘guilty’ for a tragic incident, despite
us having no hard evidence that Russia was involved and before a
proper independent investigation has even begun, while Israel is
judged ‘innocent’ for the deaths of around 600 people which they
have directly caused.

It’s revealing to reverse the positions of Russia and Israel, in
relation to the MH17 crash and the hostilities in Gaza.

Just imagine for a moment if the Malaysian airplane had come down
while flying over an area of a country bordering Israel in which
pro-Israeli rebels were operating and that these rebels were
coming under attack by the forces of the central government. We
can be sure that within minutes of the disaster the central
government, and not the rebels, would have been blamed by Western
leaders and media pundits for shooting the plane down. The rebels
would not be betrayed as “wild-eyed” trigger-happy “terrorists”,
as the rebels in Ukraine are, but principled “freedom fighters”
(and they doubtless would have received several visits from
Senator John McCain, pledging his support for their cause).

There would certainly be no talk of blame being attached to
Israel. Claims that Israel had been secretly supplying the rebels
with powerful surface-to-air missiles would have been haughtily
dismissed by establishment gatekeepers as “conspiracy theories,”
and those making the claims would have been labeled “cranks”. We
can also be 100% sure that the headline in Rupert Murdoch’s Sun, on the day
after the plane disaster would not have been “Bibi’s Missile”. If
later it was conclusively proved that the pro-Israel rebels had
shot the plane down, then it would have been brushed off by
Western elites as “a terrible mistake” and Israel most certainly
would not be threatened with sanctions.

Carte blanche for Israel

In fact we don’t need hypothetical examples to highlight the
hypocrisy surrounding the elite “outrage” over MH17. In 1973 the
Israeli air force shot down a Libyan Airlines plane, killing 108
people. No sanctions were imposed on it for doing so, no talk of
war crimes probes were launched as there is now with MH17. “The
only international condemnation came from the International Civil
Aviation Organization,” the Jerusalem Post records.

Fifteen years later, Israel’s sponsor, the US, shot down an
Iranian passenger plane, killing all 290 people on board, which
included 66 children. The New York Times editorial a few days later declared that
“while horrifying, it was nonetheless an accident”.
US Vice President George Bush stated defiantly: “I will never
apologize for the United States – I don't care what the facts
are…”

It’s also revealing to consider what would be happening now if
Russia, and not Israel, was bombing Gaza – or another territory
which it would have laid siege to for years. Imagine what David
Cameron would say, for instance, if Russia bombed a hospital, killing four people. Or if
Russian forces had killed four children playing football on the
beach. We could take it for granted there would be bellicose
calls from neocons and faux-left pundits for a “humanitarian”
military intervention to halt the Russian operation, for punitive
sanctions to be imposed on Moscow and for President Putin to be
sent to The Hague to stand trial for war crimes.

For an example of how Israel is given a “free pass” compared to
other countries, think back to 1999 when Yugoslav authorities
were carrying out what they called an “anti-terrorist” operation
in Kosovo. Western leaders accused Yugoslavia of committing
“genocide” against Kosovan Albanians and NATO forces launched a
“humanitarian” intervention which involved a 78-day bombing
campaign. The Yugoslav leader President Milosevic was indicted
for war crimes and later sent to The Hague, where he died in
imprisonment having been denied the proper medical treatment.

Israel, by contrast, is given carte blanche to carry out its own
“counter-terrorist operation” in Gaza and despite the large and
growing death toll; the liberal-left hawks who screeched so
loudly for “intervention” against Yugoslavia fifteen years ago
are strangely silent. At the same time, Israeli Prime Minister
Benjamin Netanyahu knows that no matter how many people his
forces kill, there’s little chance of him ending his days at The
Hague, like Milosevic. He simply has too many friends in high
places.

The war party

The demonization of Russia and indeed Russian allies by Western
elites and the defense of Israel are interconnected. By and
large, the same people who have been exploiting the MH17 tragedy
to try and get tougher sanctions imposed on Moscow, are the same
ones whitewashing/defending Israeli actions in Gaza.

It is important to understand that being anti-Russian, but also
pro-Israel, and pro-US are “required” positions for anyone
wanting to hold high office in the West. The Russia test, the
Israel test, and the US test can be seen as “three hoops” which
any ambitious politician needs to jump through in order to make
it to the top. British Labour leader Ed Miliband knows this and
has been hard at work.

After Prince Charles had reportedly compared President Putin to
Hitler, Miliband said the Prince “has got a point”. He has
declared himself a Zionist, and at time of writing he is jumping
through the last of the hoops – he is in the US meeting President
Obama.

Miliband knows that if he takes the “right” positions on Russia,
Israel and the US he will be “allowed” by the establishment to
become British Prime Minister next year. The system is set up to
make sure that no one who doesn’t hold the “right” views on
foreign policy is able to hold power regardless of what the
public thinks.

The pressure to conform, whether the individual concerned is in
politics or the media, is enormous. As I explained on OpEdge
here, gatekeepers play a key role in trying
to silence those with alternative views and making sure they’re
not given the opportunity to express those views in the
“mainstream” media.

Since the MH17 tragedy, truly obnoxious Russophobic gatekeepers
have been working 24/7 to enforce the War Party “Russia is
guilty” Line on MH17 and abuse those who refuse to join in.

I was labeled “bat-sxxx crazy” by a “political risk and security
analyst” based in Jerusalem for saying in a live interview,
shortly after news of the disaster broke, that it was “hard to
say” if the crash was connected to events in Ukraine.
“Contemptible Stalinist” and “repulsive”’ have been other insults
hurled at me since I went on RT and on radio in New Zealand to
say we should wait for the results of an independent inquiry
before we accuse people of shooting down the airliner. Tweets
were sent to the Guardian, a newspaper I first wrote for in 2003,
asking if they were still going to commission a “Putin
apologist.”

Those who don’t toe the rabidly Russophobic War Party line have
even been accused of supporting MH17 being shot down. I received
a tweet which said: “We see how anti-war Putinists are really in
defense of the murder of 80 kids”.
You don’t even have to be a regular RT pundit to come under
attack. Mail on Sunday columnist Peter Hitchens has become the
latest Western journalist to receive a “knock on the door” from
the neocon Twitter Thought Police for daring to say that the
US/EU created the current crisis in Ukraine. Senator Joe McCarthy
would be proud at the lengths his modern disciples are going to
snuff out free speech and harass dissenters.

Where the wind blows

The start of this current wave of Russophobia can be traced back
to last summer, when Russia helped block US plans to bomb Syria.
The Western elites wanted and still want President Assad toppled
because of Syria’s alliance with Hezbollah and Iran and they were
determined to pay Russia back for thwarting their plans. A
“regime change” in Ukraine was the way that would be achieved.

Shamefully, the tragic deaths of 298 people on MH17 are now being
exploited in pursuance of this fiercely anti-Russian political
agenda. The aim of the War Party is very transparent: it's to try
and get the general public in Western countries to hate Russia
and President Putin as much as they do, and for the EU to impose
even tougher sanctions on Russia before the results of any
independent inquiry are published. It‘s all rather reminiscent of
Iraq in 2003, when the US and UK could not wait for the weapons
inspectors to finish their job, before they went to war.

The gap between the Russophobic obsessions of the elite, and the
real concerns of ordinary people is however huge, and was starkly
demonstrated again by last weekend’s massive anti-war marches.
Media Lens, the media monitoring organization, captured this
“disconnect”’ perfectly in a single tweet:

While élite media erupt with fact-free outrage over MH17, the
people in the streets are protesting Gaza.

The British Government’s response to Israel killing children,
bombing a hospital and a center for the disabled, is to push the
EU to impose more sanctions on… Russia. You really couldn’t make
it up, could you? Two tragedies, but two very different
reactions. Reactions which tell us everything.

The statements, views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of RT.